Festival of Lights And Hope – Night Two

I’ve been finding myself getting weepy over the last couple of weeks. I couldn’t really figure out why and thought maybe it was some stress mainfesting in physical ways. It wasn’t until I was in D.C. and singing “This Little Light of Mine” with a room full of Jews that I finally understood and it was so simple: I miss my mom.

She’s not here to see my little family, the one that I built with Stephen. She’s not here to meet her granddaughter, Eliza. She can’t witness the joy on Eliza’s little face when she sees her siblings walk in the door. She can’t see the multiple tiny ways that Stephen comforts and supports me. She will never know how proud I am of my bonus kids and how lucky I am to be in their lives. She wasn’t there last night to watch Eliza unwrap a doll she had bought more than three decades ago or to see the smile spread across her tiny face as she held it close.

I miss her so much and this time of year only amplifies that. I often wonder what she would think of me as a parent. So much of what I do is influenced by my childhood and what my mom did; there are things I want to carry forward and things I want to do differenty. I hope she would be proud. I’m so grateful she was my mom.